Breakdown of Если бы у нас была чистая энергия, мы бы решили проблему глобального потепления.
мы
we
проблема
problem
у
at, by
быть
to be
решить
to solve
чистый
clean
бы
would (conditional particle) / concessive particle
если
if
энергия
energy
глобальный
global
потепление
warming
если бы
if (hypothetical)
Questions & Answers about Если бы у нас была чистая энергия, мы бы решили проблему глобального потепления.
Why are both verbs in the past tense (была, решили) if the sentence is talking about the present or future?
Why is it была and not было?
When you say 'we have' in Russian using the у нас structure, the thing you possess is the actual grammatical subject. Since энергия (energy) is a feminine noun, the past tense verb must be the feminine была.
Why use the perfective verb решили here instead of the imperfective решали?
The perfective aspect focuses on a completed result. We use решили because the sentence is talking about successfully fixing the problem, not just being in the process of dealing with it.
Why does the ending of глобальное потепление change to глобального потепления?
It is in the genitive case, which is used here to mean 'of'. The sentence is literally saying 'the problem OF global warming.' Meanwhile, проблему is in the accusative case because it is the direct object being solved.
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